Friday, 3 May 2013

Keller Quartet - Bach, Art of Fugue, 1 May 2013

Hall One, Kings PlaceDie
Kunst der Fuge, BWV 1080

András Keller, Zsófia Környei
(violins)

Zoltán Gál (viola)

Judit Szabó (cello)

How to perform The Art of Fugue? Period zealots sound
even more ridiculous here than usual when they foam at the mouth concerning their
beloved ‘authenticke’ practices, entirely missing the point of a work almost
beyond performance, which nevertheless comes to life as much as in the
performative act and its reception as in reading of the score. Post-Romantics
that we are – and those who rebel, only end up being all the more so – we love
the idea of an almost Platonic Idea of the artwork; yet we want and need to
hear it. The piano works very well; the best performance I have yet heard came
in a superlative Wigmore Hall recital from Konstantin Lifschitz. Orchestral renditions have their
place too; Hermann Scherchen demands to be heard. In an otherwise highly questionable
programme note – taken, it seems, from the Keller Quartet’s ECM recording – by Hans-Klaus
Jungheinrich, the writer, enthusiastic, as he doubtless had to be. for
performance by string quartet nevertheless sounded a note of caution, in that
the formation is to our ears is so strongly associated with Classical-Romantic
repertoire from Haydn onwards. Yet the quartet offers notable advantages in
terms of clarity; moreover, associations with later music, even later forms,
offer their own advantages.

It seems that the Keller
Quartet’s relative – though far from total – abstinence from vibrato may be
understood in this light. (I wonder what they do when pairing Bach with Kurtág:
is contrast intended, does Bach acquire a more Kurtág-like sound, or does
Kurtág veer towards the low-vibrato end of the scale?) At any rate, the initial
sound took some getting used to, though that process was certainly assisted,
even within Contrapunctus I, by the leavening of tone, especially in first
violin flourishes from András Keller, by a more generous approach. Taken as a
whole, the fugue was considerably but not exaggeratedly inflected: a compromise
perhaps, between allegedly ‘ancient’ and ‘modern’, but with virtues of its own.
The second and fourth fugues, being performed considerably quicker, more
rhythmically propulsive, stood in contrast to the first and third, offering
variety as well as continuity. Contrapunctus III benefited from further
loosening of the low-vibrato noose, followed winningly by a more dance-like
Contrapunctus IV. The opening second violin entry of Contrapunctus Vmanaged to impress upon us that this might in
some ways be considered a new section of the work: something, doubtless, to do
with the fact that the subject is first heard in the second voice, but not only
that. ‘Style’ of course played a part in performance of its successor: ‘Contrapunctus
VI, a 4, in Stylo Francese’. Characterisation and differentiation convinced;
they were certainly present but not overriding, not a substitute for the true
musical substance in harmony and counterpoint. Rhythm propelled rather than put
on a display. Harmonic shifts in the eighth fugue seemed, quite winningly, to
offer ready assimilation into the ‘string quartet tradition’ from which the
Kellers had earlier somewhat distanced themselves – ironically, perhaps, given
that the second violin remained silent for this Contrapuntus a 3. Perhaps, bearing
Mozart in mind, it was actually the string trio that was more operative as an
idea, conscious or otherwise. The kinetic energy of Contrapunctus IX brought late
Beethoven, if still at something of a remove, to mind. (We know that Beethoven
studied this particular work. Indeed, we can surely hear that he did.)

An interval separated the
ninth and tenth fugues. Contrapunctus XI again offered links with quartet
tradition, ‘progressive’ in an almost Classically developmental sense. Sinuous
chromaticism again could not help but make one think of Mozart, whilst
well-nigh motivic diminution rivalled, indeed presaged, Beethoven. Canons,
partly through rhythm but also through their two-part texture (first violin and
cello), brought Bach’s English Suites
and Inventions to mind, though their
particular character remained. Utterly satisfying in musical terms, one simply
wished for them to go on and on – as, in a sense, prophetic of the post-war
serialism of Boulez and Stockhausen, they well might. (Not for nothing did
Boulez present this very work in his Domaine musical concerts.) It was unclear
to me why the third canon marked a return to relative astringency of tone, but
its working out suggested a progressive performative choice; that is, greater
warmth infused the notes as time went on. Whole epochs of music seemed to
resound through the final movement; the golden ages of polyphony summoned
before us, as present as Bach’s incalculable legacy to his successors. The appearance
of the BACH motif and the ending in midstream (no chorale, let alone
completion) turned our attention to the more recent past, to Schoenberg (not
least his Op.31 Variations) and indeed to the modernist fragment, whether
unfinished (Moses und Aron) or a work
that so chillingly stops rather than ends (Wozzeck).
Sometimes one wonders why anyone bothered to compose music after Bach; then one
hears the imperative to do just that.